On Tue, 2005-05-17 at 11:20 -0400, David Abrahams wrote:
"Thorsten Ottosen" <nesotto@cs.auc.dk> writes:
"David Abrahams" <dave@boost-consulting.com> wrote in message
... for you. It's much less weird for me. Fixed-size arrays with sentinels come up all the time in any code where the author wasn't comfortable deducing array sizes, for example, in normal Python/C++ binding code.
They are used in indefinite form of BER encoding in networking as one example. SOAP uses sentinels at start and end in the form of <tag> </tag>
And the other case you have to consider -- also very common -- is when you have fixed-size buffers of char that aren't null-terminated strings.
These are very common in networking. For buffers to be passed to 'C' socket library. Often declared as char[] unless dynamically allocated when the would be declared ( often ) as char *. /ikh ======================================================================= This email may contain confidential and privileged information and is intended for the named or authorised recipients only. If you are not the named or authorised recipient of this email, please note that any copying, distribution, disclosure or use of its contents is strictly prohibited. If you have received this email in error please notify the sender immediately and then destroy it. The views expressed in this email are not necessarily those held by VNL, and VNL does not accept any liability for any action taken in reliance on the contents of this message. VNL does not guarantee that the integrity of this email has been maintained, nor that it is free of viruses, interceptions or interference. _______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned for all known viruses by the MessageLabs Email Security System. _______________________________________________________________________